WannaCry and Wanna Decryptor ????
 

Getting very different news on the subject. The US seems very obsessed with the fact it started with an NSA leek,, While the UK is more concerned with telling people the problem is "NOT THAT BAD"

CNN has a small article on their side-bar
Drudge has it center front page
FOX News has it as a 2nd tier story

Meanwhile at my IT bunker...

About a month ago, I moved off WIN XP on to WIN 10 and installed a VPN package, on top of the double routers I use, with 24/7 virus protection..

I'm not sure what else I can do?? :mad::mad:

Opine???

Microsoft released an update with the fix a couple of days ago. Make sure your patches are up to date.

oh, and don't open attachments from people you don't know. That's how this worm gets started inside a network. Once inside the network from anyone that opened the attachment, it no longer needs anything else to put itself on all computers it can find.

+1 Just ask John Podesta how that worked out.

And in Podesta's case don't use password as your password...

I use to wait for a couple weeks before installing updates with XP, now now it's set to auto. So I'm GTG,

I'm a little concerned that one or both can be installed on a server, like facebook, or PS.com, and leach it's way into the users via a click on a pictures or news link redirect..

JJ,

It would be very difficult to install this on a server such as facebook or PS.com. However, a link from facebook or PS.com may redirect you to the exploit. Be careful on what you click on.

The patch for this was issued by Microsoft on March 14, (MS17-010). They also released patches for out-of-production software (XP, Win 8, and Win2K8) yesterday. If you are patched your good, if not patch ASAP!

The first rule of computer security is backup, backup, backup. Back up your systems regularly. In this instance, if you do get hit by ransomeware (not just this one, there are others out there) just restore from your latest back up and hopefully most of your stuff is back. Do a risk assessment on your information. The more value that the information has to you, then increase the frequency of your backups. It is also important to store a copy of your backup offsite.

Have a laptop being serviced at The geek squad. They called this morning to let me know they have suspended repair operations until they have installed the patch company wide.

I think I will add two tablets of iron-e with my vitamins this morning.


LHC

I have back-up

1)I mirror my prime drive into a secondary and it's fully bootable. Prime dies, just switch cables.

2)I also mirror to a 1tb usb drive I store in the safe. It is also bootable and my MOBO bios can be altered to boot to an external drive..

I have thought about getting a 64GB thumb drive and making it a bootable but I think I need more than 64GB to load a full verson of WIN 10??

Anyone experiment with putting bootable WIN 10 on Thumb drives??

JJ:

The real weakness for most people seems to be Wi-Fi. Nat Geo ran a show this week call Breakthrough. This guy made a contraption called the Wi-Fi pineapple that absolutely should scare the crap out of anyone who uses Wi-Fi in there business or house and allows smart phones to connect to their system.

Spoiler: They are not secure.


LHC

Opinions please.

I have a reconditioned laptop in reserve (cost $200) along with a detachable hard drive. I backup to the detachable and if I'm bombed expect to suffer only the loss of most recent info. Then would reinvent myself using the reconditioned laptop with detachable hard drive data. Contaminated machine would then be sent to the re-conditioner for wipe and scrub if possible and then become my new "spare".

JMHO re: attachments; be aware of all attachments, even from persons you know as reliable, since their accounts may have been hijacked. If the attachment appears out of context for the sender delete the message and empty the trashcan, or contact the sender back channel and verify they sent it. The old "trust but verify".

Nothing works all the time.

And, if you want to be (should be) really careful about attachments, don't open any attachments from people you do know unless you are expecting them to send you something.

Roger, like their whole address book. Not like this doesn't happen to yahoo & hotmail users all the time.